The ‘green energy austerity’ of this government is a political choice. It’s not driven by logic or economics, but ideology.

Around 1,000 jobs were lost last month as one of Britain’s biggest solar companies went into administration – a direct result of the government’s slash and burn of green policies. There’ll be more to come as the impacts of recent announcements begin to bite.

The irony is that this came in the same week as a new report, from Bloomberg, confirmed that renewable energy is the cheapest form of energy we can build. This is the latest of many reports that show just how illogical the government’s approach to energy policy is, and just how much the renewable sector has to offer.

Around 25% of the UK’s power now comes from renewable sources – an indigenous energy supply that creates no pollution, is immune to global commodity price rises, enables us to hit climate change targets and creates jobs and industry right here in Britain.

There appear to be no downsides to renewable energy or to continuing the modest levels of support it has had to date, particularly as it evolves quickly to a place where it needs none. But the government is instead intent on pulling the rug from underneath the entire renewables industry. Why? Well, they say two things to justify the renewable energy cull: firstly, that they are trying to protect ‘hard working bill payers’, and secondly, that industries should stand on their own two feet.

Both of these claims are fundamentally dishonest. The first claim is a bit of a joke really: the government made clear that ending its support for onshore wind would only save 30p per year for ‘hard working bill payers’ but this comes at the ‘cost’ of preventing 200MW of new capacity being built. If you think about that, in terms of pence per MW constructed, you can see just how awesome value for money onshore wind is – nothing else comes close. The attack on renewable energy is simply not about reducing energy bills for people – they’re only set to rise further as the renewable energy in our mix fails to increase.

The government’s second claim about industries standing on their own two feet is entirely contradicted by the support they continue to give to other parts of the energy industry, the fossil and nuclear sectors, which have been around far longer than renewables have.

Just last month, George Osborne announced an extra £2 billion sweetener to encourage the Chinese to build the new nuclear power station at Hinckley (essentially state ownership by a foreign power). Nuclear energy will be paid twice the market price for power for the next 35 years – and then of course, we’ll have to clean up the mess left behind, which already amounts to £120 billion for the current fleet of nuclear being decommissioned. This will add massively to all our energy bills, for present and future generations. On the other hand, the 30p ‘saving’ from onshore wind won’t even pay for the stamp that delivers your future inflated energy bills.

And then there’s fossil fuel support – The International Monetary Fund reported last month that total public support (it only seems to be called a subsidy when it’s for renewable energy) for the fossil fuel industry is a staggering £30 billion per year – or over £1,000 per household per year.

In contrast, total public support for renewable energy amounted to £2.6 billion last year ¬– or £100 per household¬ per year – with onshore wind making up just £10 of that. For that 100 quid, we get 25% of our nation’s power, every year. That looks like value for money to me.

Here’s an interesting thought. On top of the £30 billion fossil fuel subsidies, we spend another £50 billion a year just burning fossil fuels. We get no new power stations for that – it’s just £50 billion straight into a furnace; quite literally burning money.

If we took the combined £80 billion we spend on fossil fuels and invested that in building new sources of green infrastructure, onshore wind for example, we could meet up to 50% of Britain’s electricity needs – each year for the next 25 years. That’s a shocking statistic. Yes, it’s a little crude, because the £80 billion is not all spent at power stations, but it gives a good handle on the scale of cost and waste in the fossil fuel sector, and the economic benefits of moving to a green economy.

It’s not just about money either, it’s also about quality of life – and life itself. Around 30,000 people die of air pollution every year in Britain. Around 10% those deaths are in London, where air pollution levels are actually illegal. Climate change is a far bigger threat of course – on a scale quite hard to comprehend. The root cause of both these issues is very simply our approach to energy (well, our government’s) and the continued burning of fossil fuels at a rate that’s unsustainable any way you look at it.

Britain is blessed with enough renewable energy to power our entire country several times over, safely, without pollution and at the lowest cost of all energy sources. In the process, we’ll create tens of thousands of new sustainable jobs in the green economy. But we have a government that is ideologically opposed to renewable energy and, with its small majority in the Commons, has moved, against public opinion, to put a stop to this incredible success story.

There is something everyone can do about this, and it’s easy – vote with your energy bills and switch to green energy. Stop buying fossil fuel energy for your home from polluting energy companies – simply stop paying them. The more people that demand green energy in their homes, the more we’ll need to build. And maybe, just maybe, that message will get through to the government.

Green companies like yourselves need to start playing the political game then. Its useless supporting Labour with their damp squid leaders and Anti Austerity Message that only students and people on benefits vote for.

Why not start donating to the conservatives, influencing policies with good common economics rather than just moaning about it all the time.

I’m a tory voter, but it pains me to see green energy always looking for subsidies or special treatment. Why not be the only energy that is viable without subsidies?

I realize other forms of energy have subsidies but, but the argument should be hammered home that wind and solar are the cheapest, quickest and easiest forms or energy, and that’s when you will really succeed.

Carina

November 4, 2015 at 9:20 pm

Dear Zag. All this has been hammered into Tory heads for years. They never intended to be the greenest government ever. They won’t ever listen and I’m sure have more worthy destinations for their cash than topping up the Tory coffers so that they can pillage or sell off more of what we hold dear. Oh and I joined the labour party recently. I’ve never believed in any party before. Corbyn has great integrity. I am no longer a student, nor am I on benefits and I don’t patronise those with whom I disagree, nor do I presume to be superior. I would suggest you read up on green energy as it’s obvious from your sweeping statements that you have not.

With respect you have scant understanding on Green Tech. The industry is new, especially when we look at low and medium scale Renewable’s. As a result we are still in heavy R&D and are not installing on the scale that we should be.

Fossil fuels get 10 x the subsidy that is earned by renewable, and as for nuclear, let’s not even talk about that, nor its negative environmental legacy.

What this post was about was a Tory minister, oh and I care not a jot what party she is from, so a minister lying to Parliment and the public and a government that is paying no heed to science, the public or indeed their own advisors.
Let’s try and remove party politics from it as it is party politics that are causing the damage.

In regard to subsidy, remove all subsidy, we can’t do that can we, why not, because we are being held to ransome by the fossil fuels industry. So, there needs to be a level playing field.

I will give your a couple of scenarios, every house in the country that is correctly orientated is funded for solar panels, business’s are able to bring in their own generation through solar panels, small and medium wind and anaerobic digestion saving hundreds of millions of tons of carbon, well it will reduce fossil fuel energy profits by millions of pounds, they will demand more subsidy to take up the slack, but government revenues are reduces as they have lost the vat on people’s bills.
We have experienced similar already, the carbon levy, whereby producers of green electricity were exempt from the carbon levy as they produced no carbon, this exception as been removed, so green energy producers now have to pay this levy, like charging alcohol duty on bottled water.
I suppose we could debate this for ever, but let us please look at the facts.
The government are lying to the public, promoting fossil fuels and fracking and will increase our carbon footprint significantly over the term of this Parliment, unless somebody take them to task and forces some sense.

Zag, the oil and gas industry get billions every year in subsidies. Did you not read the article ???
Nuclear industries all over the planet are subsidised – because they are economically unviable and always have been.
David Cameron has the nuclear, oil/gas, and fracking industries in his pockets. He will never help the renewable sector.
The labour party is not lead by a damp squib. The labour party will be in power BEFORE the next election the way things are going now.

Hi Dale,
With your clout – connections and perhaps if Ecotricity joined forces with Ovo & Good the SW would have some serious numbers to attack the SW politicians with !
Its crazy that the rest of the world is embracing Renewable energy with lots of different types of Renewable Power, Wind, Solar, Tidal, Hydro etc even the USA and China ! I’ve tried reaching you in the past but am always happy to meet as i’m Cheltenham based.
Pls keep fighting and see if you can create a JV with others in the SW specifically on this as I appreciate that naturally you obviously have your own business interests.
Best,
James.

It is a matter of survival now for UK Green Tech, after spending £3M over the last 4 years successfully developing a new wind energy generator with Siemens, with public support through R&D Tax Credits, we find that our government is trying to shut down the UK market.

Paul

November 5, 2015 at 3:48 pm

What area of solar panels would be needed to produce the same amount of power as the new hinkley c power station , when and only when you have ansewed that question do you have any right to criticise the government ps same for wind turbines please

Guido

November 6, 2015 at 10:01 am

A very rough idea of the space required:

Hinkley = 3200MW
Roof top Solar Wmax: approximately 8m2/kW
5km x 5km of solar at peak
The actual output would be about 30% of this.
15km x 15km along with all the problems of storage and output stability included.

The money would provide for 86,000 4N VAWT wind turbines, the same amount roughly as the number of pylons in the UK.

At 100kw peak, that is 8.6 GW, well above Hinckley C, which by the way is unproven technoligy and is folly. I do not think it will be built and fully commissioned in my lifetime, oh, and the power outages will be with us long before they break ground.

All we have at the moment is a MOU with the Chinese and the French, negotiations are not finished.

And then there are the legal challenges in the EU parliament made by Austria. They are fighting the unfair subsidies(Zag are you reading this?) being used to prop up the Hinkley C deal.
FYI it is not 1 reactor but 2 they want to build. Disastrous for our country. A white elephant that will never fly. How far down this road must we travel before our government changes direction?

1000 green energy jobs were lost in the South last month due to Cameron’s austerity cuts to renewable energy subsidies.

If the £12.00 credit I just received towards my @ecotricity dual fuel bill is my share of Cameron’s massacre of the UK’s green energy industry Ecotricity can have it back as a donation!

Remember there are subsidies for the nuclear, oil, coal & gas industries, but they pollute our environment and we (the tax payer and the charities we support) end up paying the clean up costs, if it’s even possible to ‘clean up’.

Ms. Angry from Rottingdean

Guido

November 6, 2015 at 9:51 am

What never seems to be addressed, is than reducing energy use, is better than producing it through a renewable alternative.
If the amount invested into Hinkley, was instead spent on basic insulation on the worse of the UK housing stock, the energy saved would far greater.
That in addition to a more comfortable living space, lower fuel bills and less dependance on energy fluctuations.
The only argument against it seems to be it would reduce ‘economic growth’ in the long run.

We are of course reducing our energy usage, the main issue is population growth, remember the population is expected to grow by a further 10 million in the coming years.

I saw an argument from a climate denier a few months ago whereby she argued that we had not built any new power stations in the last ten years therefore we did not need renewables, forgetting that renewable now contribute significantly to the energy mix in the UK, without which we would have needed to build significant new capacity, just to keep up with population growth.
The current attack on renewables by the tory government makes lots of sense to me, and I would wholeheartedly support it if I was an investor in fossil fuels.
If renewables, energy independence and self-sufficiency can be stopped, then we hand back the monopoly to the large corporations. Securing profit and value for shareholders, and revenue for the government.
It is simply a matter of cash before the environment, maybe it would change if politicians could be held to task for what they do in office when they leave. Somebody needs to put this government in court as the Dutch and the Pakistanis have with their governments.

Energy saving measures are everywhere Guido.
From the LED light in my living room to The AA rated dryer I use to dry my laundry.
While I agree that money spent on insulating inefficient homes will be well spent, Hinkley C will produce electricity: Not every home uses electricity for heat.
The investment in all forms of energy saving measures represents economic growth.

Take a good look at all his connections to Fossil, fracking and nuclear and yo will see quite clearly why he is against renewables.
Regarding the issue of money spent on Hinkley or renewables. There is a large difference that needs to be clearly understood.
Hinkley will NEVER be built. The ecconmic case for it is just not there.
Austria has filed an EU lawsuit to stop the project on the grounds of unfair subsidies.
Cameron has still not found the remaining 12-14 Billion to build the plant.
Most important is that EDF is very wary of entering into a project to build an EPR plant design that has yet to be completed.
OF the 3 EPRs underconstruction;
Finnland’s plant will open 9yrs lat(or never?) and Billions over budget.
The French EPR has forced Ariva into insolvency and the French government has begun a shift away from nuclear power alltogether.
Meanwhile the 3rd reactor being built in China is 3 years behind and worrying the entire nuclear industry due to a lack of safty standards.
For all these reasons we must embrace renewable energy now whil the lights are still burning bright.

I only found zerocarbonista this morning after contacting Ecotricity to no immediate avail and deciding to read Dale’s wiki page. Various solutions are offered, I believe what would be best is to canvass or support canvassing the public, educating them so they understand and can demand solutions from politicians. I explain more on my website http://www.ourvote.org or http://www.rational.org.uk (I typed in the latter wrong in my previous post, which will take you to another org)

Zero Carbonista

This blog is about answers to the big questions - how will we keep the lights on, what kind of cars will we drive (will we drive?) and how will we feed ourselves - in a post oil world, and a world where we can't afford to keep burning things and throwing things away. Energy, Transport and Food are the three big issues.